brentwood.gov.uk

Propose Development at Sites 010, 023A & 023B: We live at (address) and would like to strongly oppose the proposed development in Pilgrims Hatch, alongside the A12 (Site Ref's 023A & 023B) and the proposed development at Ongar Road Sow and Grow (Site Ref 010). My husband and I live in Brentwood with our young son and I personally have been a resident here for all of my life. Brentwood is currently such a beautiful, quaint little town and it is such a shame to see it being mowed down and over-developed in this way, particularly when it's on 'protected' green belt land. We lay out below our reasons for strongly opposing these proposed developments below (in no specific order): According to your plans you were proposing a potential extra 288 dwellings in just one of these developments. That could see a possible further 576 cars on the road (based on the 2015 UK average of 2 cars per household). That is for just one of these development sites only! This increase has a detrimental impact on both the traffic and the environment in the local area; There has been a noticeable increase in traffic along the Ongar Road since the building of the Highwood estate, particularly at peak times and weekends the traffic queues right back over the A12 bridge to the junction of Windsor Road, and we note that the bus routes have also now changed to use Ongar Road instead of Doddinghurst Road (we assume to free up Doddonghurst Road in preparation for this development). Building yet more estates in the area would put even more strain on an already busy road with limited side 'cut through' roads causing yet more congestion; There would also be a significant increase in traffic along Sandpit Lane, commonly used as a cut through from Pilgrims Hatch. This road is already in dire shape and is, in our opinion, a fairly risky road to use at the best of times (I personally have had a couple of near misses along this road myself due to oncoming traffic approaching too fast combined with its narrow and unkempt nature, the number of potholes at the side of the road are ridiculous). More traffic along this road would potentially just result in more accidents; There would be a detrimental impact on school placements. You would need to build more schools as well as extend the already existing ones to keep up with this level of development in the town. There is pressure on already struggling schools to take on more pupils in the same number of classrooms and the bigger classes get the less effective the education is to the individual child (that's assuming you're lucky enough to get a place accepted at a local school in the first place); There would be a detrimental impact on waiting times at GP's. You keep building more homes but yet you are not building any more doctors surgeries (or extending the already existing ones). We already have to wait an average of 3 weeks, sometimes longer, to get a non-emergency appointment at our doctors surgery (and that's not even necessarily seeing our own GP). More homes mean more patients locally which means longer waiting times at local surgeries and more impact on an already stretched health service; The proposed plot of land is supposed to be Green Belt protected (re Site Ref's 023A & 023B). It angers us that the Green Belt protection seems to stand for nothing to local councils anymore. My husband and I have many times taken my young son for a walk alongside these fields or been to see the horses and it saddens us that this would no longer be able to be the case. We are slowly robbing this town of it's beautiful greenery that used to make it so quaint and we are slowly turning it into yet another concrete jungle full of pollution instead of fresh air and brick walls instead of green fields, much like Romford; The more fields that are built on the more strain this places on the local drainage system. The drainage system along Ongar Road is already clearly struggling as whenever it rains we have to walk or drive through great puddles that accumulate across both the road and the whole of the pavement, taking away land where rain water can naturally drain away is just going to add to the problem; The loss of wildlife would be tragic; There would also be a negative impact on the local environment, both while the development was being built and then due to the subsequent increase in traffic therafter; In addition to the above, re Site Ref's 023A & 023B we would also strongly oppose our road, Viking Way, being considered as an access road for the development (we are currently under the impression that Doddinghurst Road would be the preferred access but that our road was being considered). The increase in traffic would turn our quiet and peaceful little cul-de-sac into a potentially hazardous and busy through road and potentially be detrimental to our house prices as a result. We have a young child and we actively chose to live in a cul-de-sac, not a through road. We moved to this particular area because it was a quiet little cul-de-sac in a quaint little town situated among beautiful views of greenery and fields (allegedly protected by Green Belt) and we feel genuinely very sad that it appears that it's slowly being chipped away. Once it's gone, it's gone for good.